Primary Reconstruction/Volumetric Data

8.5 Starting a Primary & Study Reconstructions

The Primary & Study Reconstructions consists in two automatic and consecutive processes that allow the

user to create a study directly from the RawData.

The following explains how to run a Primary & Study Reconstruction.

After a RawData has been open, select the “Primary

& Study Reconstruction” button (see the red circle

in the picture).

The “Reconstruction Parameters” dialog box will

appear.

The “Reconstruction Step” and “Field Size”

parameters are used by the Primary Reconstruction (

for a complete description of these fields refere to the

previous chapter).

The “Slice Thickness” area represents the thickness

of the final axial slices of the study. This thickness

can be modified by using the two buttons “+” and “-“

or dragging the sliding bar next to them.

The “Delete VolData document” allows to

automatically delete the volumetric data document

that will be created during this process.

Once you have selected your settings click on the

“OK” button.

A blue ROI (Region Of Interest) box will appear on

the lateral image.

The ROI can be adjusted by grabbing the red target

markets located at the corners of the ROI and in the

middle of the borders.

The ROI (drawn in blue) it is included inside an area

(not visible on the screen) represended on the

pictures on the side by the two green horizontal lines.

This area represents the region that will be analized

during the primary reconstruction. Using the two

buttons “Minimun volume reconstruction” and

“Total volume reconstruction” (located on the

“Reconstruction Parameters” window) it is possible to

define the size of this area:

• Selecting “Minimun volume reconstruction”

the reconstructed area will just include the ROI.

• Selecting “Total volume reconstruction” the

reconstructed area will have the maximun

dimensions. This option can be useful when

further then the study the volumetric data of the

entire volume is desired.

Once the size and the inclination of the ROI has been

defined right click.

The “Reconstruction Options” box will appear.

You can insert a comment, that will be associated to

this Primary Reconstruction and to the Study, by

typing on the upper box.

After typing a comment three different options can be

selected:

1. Start: starts the Primary & Study Reconstruction

process.

2. Store: store the settings in order to run the

Primary & Study Reconstruction later.

3. Cancel: abort the process

Select “Start”.

The reconstruction process will start immediately and

a progress bar will appear.

At the end of the process the “Visualization window”

will appear, showing the central axial of the

reconstructed area.

For a detailed explanation of this dialog refer to

10.10.1 “Visualization window”.

After changing your settings click on the “Apply”

button.

NOTE:

The adjustments made with the Visualization Window

will be applied to all the axial images, before creating

the volumetric data.

The study window will appear.

8.6 Night Reconstruction

Night Reconstruction stores multiple primary reconstruction, to be performed at a later time.

8.6.1 Storing multiple primary reconstruction

Select File Open…

The “Open” window will appear.

Click on the “RawData” button.

The “RawData list” window appears. Select a patient

and the click “OK”.

The frontal view of the selected patient will be

displayed.

Select Primary reconstruction Primary

reconstruction.

The “Reconstruction Parameters” box will appear.

Select the parameters for the reconstruction and

click on the “OK” button

Adjust the size of the reconstructed area and then

right click.

The “Reconstruction Options” box will appear.

Type a distinguishing comment related to this

Primary Reconstruction. This will help identify

different studies conducted on the same patient.

Type your comment and click on the “Store” button.

The “RawData list” window reappears. Select

another patient (it is possible to select the same

patient to perform a new Primary Reconstruction on

it) and repeat the procedure. When finished adding

Primary Reconstruction, click on the “Cancel”

button.

8.6.2 Running multiple primary reconstruction

Select Reconstruction Start Night

Reconstruction

The “Night Reconstruction List” window will appear.

It displays all the stored primary reconstructions.

To delete an item from the list highlight the item and

click on the “Remove” button.

To begin multiple primary reconstructions, click on

the “Start” button.

The process will begin. When the process is

finished, the new volumetric data will be

automatically saved and stored

9 Volumetric data

9.1 Introduction

After the Primary Reconstruction is finished a stack of axial slices has been generated. This stack of axial

slices is called Volumetric Data.

The axial slices that form the Volumetric Data are always horizontal.

Two different views can be used to display the volumetric data: the Volumetric view and the MPR view.

9.2 Opening a Volumetric Data

Select File->Open…

The “Choose NNT Document” window will appear.

Click on the “Volumetric Data” button.

The “Volumetric Data List” window will appear.

Highlight the desired patient by clicking on the name

and then select the “OK” button.

NOTE: If the desired patient does not appear on the

upper part of the list it is possible to scroll the list by

editing the initial of the patient’s surname in the

provided field, located on the top left corner of the

window (see the red circle on the picture on the side).

The volumetric view will appear.

9.3 Volumetric view

The Volumetric view is used to display the stack of axial images in relation to the two scout views.

Following is a brief description of the volumetric view and its different fields:

Following is a short explanation of each field:

1. Anterior Scout View: shows the anterior-posterior image of the acquired area.

2. Lateral Scout View: shows the lateral image of the acquired area.

3. Axial stack view: display the entire stack of axial images.

4. Single Axial View: display the axial image corresponding to the position on the two scout views.

5. Axial Sliding Bar: allows moving through the stack of axial images.

6. “Show/Hide reference” button: Shows/Hides the reference lines of the displayed axial image

inside the two scout views.

9.5 Creating a new study

In order to create a study the Volumetric view must be active.

To switch to the Volumetric view, select the

“Volumetric data view” button from the main

toolbar.

Before creating a study, a ROI (Region Of Interest)

must be defined.

To define the ROI, once the volumetric view is

active, select the “Study Reconstruction” button

from the main toolbar.

A blue ROI box (Region Of Interest) will appear on

both the two scout views.

The ROI of the two images is the same area viewed

from two different points of view.

Between the two scout view a sliding bar allows

selecting the thickness of the reconstructed axial

slices. The minimum thickness, corresponds to the

one used during the Primary Reconstruction

process.

On each scout image the ROI can be adjusted by

grabbing the red target markets located at the

corners of the ROI and in the middle of the borders.

On the anterior scout view the inclination, the

position and the width of the ROI can be adjusted.

On the top right corner of the image the width (in

mm) and the inclination of the ROI are shown.

On the bottom right corner the amount of resulting

axial slices is displayed.

On the lateral scout view, the height, width…

…inclination and position of the ROI can be

adjusted.

On the top right corner of the image the width and

height (in mm), and the inclination of the ROI are

shown.

In alto a destra dell’immagine viene indicata

larghezza ed altezza in millimetri della ROI ed il suo

eventuale angolo di inclinazione.

Once you are satisfied with your settings right click.

In a few seconds the “Visualization Window” will

appear, showing the central axial of the

reconstructed area.

In this woindow four different buttons are available.

These buttons are:

• “Apply”: apply the current settings and open

the new study.

• “Cancel”: discharge the current study and retry

to beginning of the “Study Reconstruction”

procedure.

• “Store study and continue”: store the current

study and retry to beginning of the “Study

Reconstruction” procedure in order to give the

possibility to create a different study on the

same patient.

• “End study Rec. Mode”: store the current

study and retry to the volumetric data.

For a detailed explanation of this dialog refer to

10.10.1 “Visualization window”

In case the “Apply” button has been selected, the

study will appear.

9.6 Multiple study reconstructions

This option, allows to plan consecutive study reconstructions (on the same volumetric data), that can be run

subsequently. It can be considered an alternative to the “Store study and continue” button located on the

visualization window, and it usage is suggested in case the analysis of the patient requires the reconstruction

of multiple areas.

Next are the steps to follow to plan and run a multiple study reconstructions:

From the main toolbar select the “Plan multiple

study reconstructions ” button

Adjust the ROI as explained in the previous chapter.

Once you are satisfied with your settings right click

The “Choose to:” window will appear.

Select the “Store current reconstruction and

continue planning another one” button.

The “Insert label” window will appear; edit a

comment in order to identify the current

reconstruction, then select the “Ok” button.

The software wil retry to the beginning of the “Study

Reconstruction” procedure in order to give the

possibility to plan a different study on the same

patient.

Once all the reconstructions have been planned,

right click and select the “Stop ‘Multiple study

reconstructions’ mode” on the “Choose to:”

window.

Next steps is to start the process for the creation of

the planned reconstructions.

Select Study reconstruction A Start multiple

study reconstructions.

The “Multiple study reconstruction list” window will

appear.

This window lists the reconstructions that have

been planned on the current patient.

If you wish to remove one or more reconstructions

from the list, highlight it and select the “Remove”

button.

In order to start the process select the “Start”

button.

Each study will be automatically created and stored.

Once finished the current volumetric data will be

closed.

NOTE: The list of planned study reconstructions

is temporary and it is destroyed once the

volumetric document is closed.

10 Working with a study

10.1 Introduction

After a study has been created, it contains only the two scout views and the stack of axial images generated

from the ROI set up inside the Volumetric data window.

10.2 Opening a Study

Select File->Open…

The “Choose NNT Document” window will appear.

Click on the “Study” button.

The “Study List” window will appear.

Highlight the desired patient by clicking on the name

and then select the “OK” button.

NOTE: If the desired patient does not appear on the

upper part of the list it is possible to scroll the list by

editing the initial of the patient’s surname in the

provided field, located on the top left corner of the

window (see the red circle on the picture on the side).

The study view will appear

10.3 Study window

Following is a brief description of the main window of the study and its different fields:

1. Anterior scout view: shows the anterior-posterior image of the acquired area.

2. Study & Exam Data: shows information about the patient, the study and the scan.

Document Code: name of the document main file.

Document Size: size of the entire study.

Patient Scan Date: date of the scan.

Document Creation Date: date of the study creation.

Scout Views: number of scout view images.

Axial images: number of axial images.

Single Cross Sections: number of single cross sections images.

Sequence of Cross Sections: number of sequence of cross section images.

Panoramic Sections: number of panoramic section images

3D Reconstructions: number of 3D images.

Axials thickness: thickness of axial sections.

kV(AP): KiloVolt level used by the x-ray source for the anterior scout view.

mA(AP): milliAmperes used by the x-ray source for the anterior scout view.

kV(LL): KiloVolt level used by the x-ray source for the lateral scout view.

mA(LL): milliAmperes used by the x-ray source for the lateral scout view.

Detector field (inches): size of the detector field used for the scan.

Exposure Time (s): time of exposure to the x-ray emission during the scan.

mAs: product of the tube current and x-ray exposure time measured in

seconds.

3. Toolbar: contains buttons to enable various secondary reconstruction toolbars.

4. Lateral scout view: shows the lateral image of the acquired area.

The study is the document that will contain all the cuts performed by the operator (Single Cross sections,

Sequence of Cross Sections, Panoramic Section and 3D images).

As previously explained, at the beginning the study contains only the two scout views and the stack of axial

images generated from the volumetric data